AlexB

There is pretty much only one thing wannabe punkies and feminasty ne’erdowells ought to be up to this august (hehe) weekend, and that’s Combat Latent Inequalities Together at this year’s C.L.I.T.Fest in Chicago, August 2nd-4th! We are writing this statement to voice our clear and unequivocal endorsement of the show and to encourage all who are able to ditch your original plans and “yolo” your way to CLIT Fest.

A few words about why you should stop practicing for international couch potato championships and come joins us:

“Intersectionality” may be the word of the day, but as many of us know, so often it can be an empty refrain. To us, CLIT Fest is exactly the opposite: a truly intersectional, deeply intimate experience designed to address the effects of patriarchy and colonialism in the everydayness of our social spaces and scenes. It is a body-positive, anti-racist, anti-ableist, femme-positive, guitar-wailing-zine-and-skill-sharing romp of a good time, with a heavy focus on supporting women/yn of all stripes and all gender configurations. There are kids, crayons, and parents. And food. And smiling (let’s be honest, the “show scowl” is harder to pull off when everyone is being so nice to you).

And it is because of this attentiveness to the minute details of oppression, and the linking of the scene to political ends, that we feel a strong resonance with CLIT Fest. We understand, as do the CLIT Fest organizers, that resistance does not begin from abstract commitments to causes, but from creating concrete spaces where we can congregate, gather, come to know each other, and find each other in the darkness. It comes from acts of reclamation, and from defending what we have reclaimed. It comes from connecting the embodied, local politics we create to the global systems that seek to oppress and divide us. We need to support each other across these lines, not only out of ‘solidarity’ but out of a mutual need for survival–and we can’t imagine anyone better to have our backs than the CLIT Fest team.

We also recognize, more specifically, the feminist/womanist/trans vision of gender justice that is central to CLIT Fest and its inspiration. We understand that it is through gendered, sexualized narratives that the voices of colonized peoples are silenced and that in this vein, the bodies of Palestinians, Bedouins, African migrants, and other groups targeted by the Israeli state have been ranked in a hierarchy of value as less-valuable—less worthy of having, breathing, and giving life. We understand that it is specifically on the backs of and through the labor of the women of all of these groups that so much resistance has historically rested, at the same time as it is in their name that the colonizer claims to come to the rescue—in other words, “ white men saving brown women from brown men”. And we see the parallels in how the State—and as a consequence our communities—proliferate misogyny and racism here in the heart of empire by internalising these narratives. The root is always the same: worldwide colonialism, occupation, and white supremacy. At CLIT Fest, we dream a dream where we’ve obliterated them all and are still dancing.

So in the wake of draconian anti-abortionlaws and mass sterilization plans, worldwide hunger strikes from California prisons to Israeli jails, and so much more that we don’t have the room to name, we feel more than ever the need to express our support for the coolest DIY political thing on our plate right now—at least, until the 4th Annual Black and Brown Punk Show—and to link our struggles across the latent (and explicit) inequalities that keep us from seeing the centrality of gender, race, and total makedestroy liberation to all our efforts.

This year, proceeds raised by CLIT Fest will be going to the always-phenomenal Transformative Justice Law Project, bringing a much-needed focus on trans issues and a critical angle to the originally body-centric/reductive politics in the fest’s name. TLJP is a prison abolitionist organization that provides “free, zealous, life-affirming, and gender-affirming holistic criminal legal services to low-income and street based transgender and gender non-conforming people targeted by the criminal legal system”, name-changing services, and all sorts of other stuff we would suck at without people who’ve passed the bar to help us.

Punks Against Apartheid likes to announce new members of our network, even though we’ve missed a few here and there. Our members include bands, solo artists, filmmakers, and others active in punk cultural production. And by the way, if you or your band haven’t signed on to said points of unity, then what the hell are you waiting for?

And so, in that spirit, we’d like to welcome the newest member artists of PAA: All Torn Up and Huasipungo out of NYC and Action Sedition from Montreal! If you haven’t listened to these bands but are a fan of good, tight, streetwise punk rock that seeks to tear down borders, then do yourself a favor and go do it right now.

There’s definitely something symbolic in announcing all three of these excellent bands at the same time. Two cities are represented here, both with their own particular and solid contribution to the history of hardcore and street punk. But these bands are also burrowing from within not one but two countries — Canada and the United States — each with their own particular histories of racial genocide and imperialism. Three languages are represented among them: English for All Torn Up, Spanish for Huasipungo, and French for Action Sedition.

There’s a trite and tired saying that music breaks down borders, but when it’s punk rock, a sound that has been animated by resistance to alienation and exploitation from its very beginnings, then it’s hard to deny the wisdom of such a saying. And so it’s only fitting that these three bands be welcomed into the fold of punk rock solidarity with the Palestinian resistance to colonialism and apartheid. Welcome friends!

Viva le punk! Viva Palestina!

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If the recent bombardment of Gaza by Israel in the ominously named Operation Pillar of Cloud has confirmed anything, it’s that solidarity is sorely needed, perhaps now more than ever. In the wake of these attacks and the World Social Forum-Free Palestine, recently held in Porto Alegre from November 28th-December 1st, Punks Against Apartheid wishes to answer the call to intensify BDS campaigns worldwide and redouble its commitment to solidarity with the people of Palestine.

As always, we heard the same tired and offensive script about a “two-sided conflict” as the fourth largest military on the planet did their best to lay waste to the world’s largest open-air prison. We heard so much empty twaddle about the Palestinians’ need to “renounce violence” while little pressure was placed on Israel to do anything of the sort. And even now, when the final count of deaths is shamefully lopsided (160 Palestinians, 6 Israelis) we hear close to nothing about holding Israel’s system of apartheid and occupation accountable. We’re also aware that in the weeks since the declaration of this recent cease-fire (a cease-fire Israel has several times) there have been some significant developments in the Palestinian struggle, and in particular the movement for boycott, divestment and sanctions of Israel, .

From the to , to , BDS is continuing to gain ground and generalise the Palestinian struggle worldwide. In the coming months, we will be answering the call to intensify boycott activities by setting up fundraisers featuring local and regional punk bands for the people of Palestine, building even more links between punk groups and the Palestine solidarity movement. But even more importantly, in the true rebel music spirit, we’d like to announce Punks Against Apartheid’s newest and most exciting adventure: releasing our very first music compilation for digital download!

For the price of a beer, or maybe a few, you’ll be able to purchase an online album featuring songs from punk, hardcore and ska groups who are supportive of the Palestinian struggle and the cultural boycott of Israel. All proceeds will go to benefit to-be-determined Palestinian groups fighting for a free Palestine. If you are interested in contributing to our comp, . We want to take the cultural boycott beyond the big names, forge links and build bridges too freaky and too militant for their tastes! And our message: decolonize everything, end all apartheids, and free Palestine!

And let’s not forget that the momentum the worldwide solidarity movement is gaining becomes especially poignant as winter closes in, and announcements about summer festival seasons soon start poking their head out. As much as the big names don’t really tickle our fancy, we will not stop TP-ing their reputation and egging their proverbial status until they join the side of justice. What makes this coming music fest season particularly terrifying is that Lollapalooza, one of North America’s largest musical shit-shows, will also be holding a version in Tel Aviv! Perry Farrell, a dyed-in-the-wool Zionist who has raised large sums of the money for the IDF himself, is positively over the moon about delivering Lolla’s cultural cache to the world’s last legal apartheid state. Getting started swift publisher turned there is targeted both at seasoned designers and average joes alike.

Rubbing salt in the open wound is the fact that the Tel Aviv Lolla will be held in Yarkon Park, which is built on the ruins of the Palestinian village of Jarisha. We must ensure that the campaigns to pressure bands not to play at Lollapalooza are impossible to ignore. We at PAA will do everything we can to be a part of that. We’re not going away anytime soon–that’s for damned sure. There’s much work to be done, and the stakes are arguably as high as they’ve ever been. And so, for that matter, are the opportunities to bring Israel’s crimes against the Palestinian front-and-center. We write to you all with loving rage to say that we intend to dive in head first. And we intend to get it done in the only way that we know how: loud and brash and shameless!

Chicago punks, Palestine solidarity activists, disenchanted rabble-rousing youth, and everyone in between should clear their schedules and/or plan on skipping work to make it to this year’s 3rd Annual Black & Brown Punk Show being held in Chicago on and. Mark it on your calendars! Hip-hop and punk acts from the city as well as out of state will be gathering for this event “about rebellion, DIY, survival, and strength in the face of adversity”, as well as “north/south side solidarity”, and of course, playing some kickass music! Wear your moshing shoes. We would like to say a few words about why we are coming out supporting the local scene like this, as well as why you should get off your ass and go if you can!

We understand the intimate connections between struggles and the need to work at the intersections between global solidarity and concrete, local organising to support communities being targeted by the state. In this sense, Punks Against Apartheid would like to express our full support and endorsement of the show. We share with the organisers the understanding that survival is about creating the spaces we lack or that were stolen from us to work towards a more just future. No one will give us these spaces; they have to be made, taken, and defended. In the best of the radical punk tradition, the work being done by the organizers of the 3rd Annual Black & Brown Punk Show has shown an understanding that we cannot simply be passive in the face of racist, sexist, homophobic/transphobic society, but that we must create safe spaces—spaces of liberation—within it. The same week that , in an abandoned building in a West Side Chicago neighborhhood—this only a few months after , not to mention the now well-known nearby case of. The same month that undocumented youth in a single detention center they infiltrated, word also got out that the Zionist brother of Rahm “Slashy McSlash-Slash” Emmanuel (who himself ) was pushing for , and a known. This not long last month’s revelation that (including Chicagoland’s and ) since the beginning of 2012 alone. The list of indignities, brutalisations, outrages—from Palestine to Chicago—are unfortunately endless. But the common threads are clear: erasure, ethnic cleansing, slow-death of occupied communities. These acts of violence are neither isolated nor individual: they are connected to broader systems of power, white supremacy, and capitalist/colonial domination which enable and sanction them. You can select the charities to allow your participants to choose from and send out invitations to fill out your surveys via email. We are left, then, with two options: defend our communities or go on the attack. We here at PAA are thrilled to support the grassroots gathering on the 24th & 25th, because we’re certain it will be a little bit of both!

Anyone who has bummed around the punk scene for more than a minute can tell the difference between the (literally) whitewashed, apolitical testosterone-pumping parties that pass for ‘shows’ and the kind of principled, grassroots music that serves as a form of movement building and community empowerment. This year, money raised for the show will go to three community organizations: an inner city youth organization, , “that teaches (predominately) black and brown youth about true hip hop, graffiti and breakdance”, the , which provides undocumented youth with funds for college, and the , fighting for an unarmed Black womyn who was killed by off duty police officer in April in the Lawndale neighborhood. We will be there selling zines & patches (hot off the presses!) and trying to help raise as much money as we can for these organisations (1/3rd of our proceeds). We will also be letting people in on some exciting actions happening down the line in Chitown. And of course we will be there, fists raised and feet swinging with loving rage. Viva Palestina! Up the punx!
~PAA.

We at Punks Against Apartheid are all about supporting our peoples’ projects, whether it’s noisy rebel music or noisy rebel literature! So, we are proud to announce the launching of super multi-talented awesome PAA member Sabina England‘s book, Urdustan!

Urdustan is a series of short stories featuring South Asian characters who lead different lives in different countries around the world. Sabina writes:

Urdustan is a book for my people: punks, outcasts, rejects, Desi punks, Taqx peeps, Deafies, misfits, losers, geeks, whores, and for the unpopular kids in school that everyone hate and pick on and beat up at the playground. Especially for the brown ones.

Urdustan contains seven stories, each from different perspectives but unified under the themes of identity & living in the margins. As Jean Marc of the Kollector blog writes, hers is a kind of insurgent writing that bucks expectations of her from either side of the cultural divides she straddles:

…she doesn’t play the game right: as a Desi…some might expect a docile woman, waiting to fill in the shoes that have been carved for her by traditions, centuries of ways of doing/being. No way, no way, she’s a strong opiniated woman with ideas, dreams and behaviors that will set your world and hers in fire if you don’t look twice and see all the superb humanity, the warm Understanding and the Love behind it all.

When we first got to know Sabina, it was during our campaign to get Jello Biafra and the Guantanamo School of Medicine to cancel their show in Israel, for which she made a very powerful video. Since then, we have collaborated frequently, and we are super excited to get our hands on this and read it to pieces, and hope you all can support her work and check it out too!

Sabina’s new book is only available from Lulu.com. You can follow some of Sabina’s own thoughts on the novel on her The American Dream is Dead blog. Purchasing Urdustan from the link above supports both Sabina and Punks Against Apartheid.

We, Punks Against Apartheid, are writing you to urge that you cancel your show in Tel Aviv in September. We do so as artists, activists, musicians, and people who place themselves in the strong anti-racist tradition that formed punk and which keeps it relevant today. This is a legacy you yourselves should be completely aware of. When you first formed in Los Angeles in the ’80s, it was the experimental, fluid moment that the punk scene was going through at the time that gave you the space you needed to take on a new sound, mixing elements of funk and other styles into your music. This was a scene noted for being uniquely multiracial, the scene that gave rise to Fishbone and Suicidal Tendencies; not to mention Fear, so important to the early formation of hardcore punk, a band that you, Flea, played the bass for! You even had Gang of Four’s Andy Gill produce one of your albums, and DH Peligro–originally of Dead Kennedys fame–ended up replacing Jack Irons on the drums. So what’s the rub? Well, while some in the mainstream may have forgotten this history–scratching their heads at why a bunch of no-good punks would bother with a band as commercial as RHCP–we have not, and we intend to remind you and your fans of these roots. Because your proximity to punk as a band should have put you in touch with the best tendencies of rebel music, of music as a form of resistant community–and that is something to be cherished, not to be rejected by playing in Israel. By doing so, you would be, in the words of the Israeli group Boycott from Within, . It is for this reason that we were saddened and disappointed to hear of your announced show in Israel. We would have thought that RHCP would be aware of the pressing issues of racism and war in today’s world, something no one–especially punks–could miss. We would have thought that your experience in the scene that catapulted you to fame, a scene known for its strong principles and solidarity with struggles worldwide, would have been aware that Israel’s intention in making such a big deal about your gig is part of a cool, calculating game to cover up its crimes against Palestinians.1

We would have thought that you would have done your homework, and found out that, after their forced removal from the majority of Palestine in 1948, Palestinians have been living under occupation by the Israeli military for over 40 years now. We would have thought that you would have wanted to learn, before playing right into the Israeli state’s hands, that Palestinians live in segregated spaces all across the West Bank and in the open-air prison of the Gaza Strip, and that the apartheid-like laws of the Israeli state make it so that even a Palestinian fan who *wanted* to come to your show would be almost guaranteed to be turned down, . We would have expected you to be appalled and disgusted, as artists but more importantly as human beings, by the shallow exploitation of art and entertainment such as yours to somehow justify some of the most despicable acts of inhumanity against a people in resistance for their basic civil rights and for liberation. Maybe you never had the same political leanings as your fellow punks–but make no mistake, your decision to play is political, just as much as your decision not to play would be. We are asking you to honor the global boycott launched by Palestinian civil society in 2005 as a non-violent means to achieve their basic human rights. Refuse to play in Israel, like many other musicians from Roger Waters, to Devendra Banhart, Macy Gray, and Elvis Costello (to name a few), and join a growing movement of artists who, like in the era of South African apartheid, say . It will show whether you wish to stand on the right side of history and refuse to be used to put a “good face” on ethnic cleansing, apartheid, and occupation, or if you wish to be shills for a political circus much larger than any one of us. It will remain to be seen whether or not the fame and commercialization RHCP has goten over the years has completely wiped out any integrity you ever had, or if there are still punks beneath the flashy lacquer.

We ask you this as fellow punks, from a scene that, rather than being dead, is becoming a threat again! Maybe not on the national scene, but in our small communities we are building–and what is more true to punk’s origins than local, vibrant DIY-scenes, everywhere from Chicago to Indonesia? Take a second to honor these scenes and the grassroots, political resistance they represent and say no to playing in September.

Indeed, as BfW has pointed out in the same letter, the production company hosting your performance, Shuki Weiss Promotion and Production LTD. , has close ties to the Israeli government and absolutely intends to use your act as a shallow political theater to distract from the oppression of Palestinians. [↩]

It says a lot about the modern music industry that a band like Simple Plan is somehow considered “punk. ” It says even more when a band like them are booked for the expressed intention of entertaining apartheid. That’s precisely what they intend to do at their Tel Aviv show on May 5th. If you’re one of the people reading this and asking “wait, which one is Simple Plan?” then you’re surely not alone. It’s pretty hard to tell them apart from Avril Lavigne, Sum 41, Good Charlotte, Reliant K or any of the other poppy Blink-182 soundalikes that seem to be the Big Four record labels’ idea of punk rock. In fact, calling such groups “pop punk” might run the risk of discrediting Screeching Weasel, Pansy Division or others who, in originally forging the sub-genre, brought some actual substance to the table. A more appropriate term for Simple Plan and their ilk might be “faux punk” or “mall punk. ” True, it’s a bit derisory, but that doesn’t make it any less apt. This is music that has been made to be sold more than listened to. It’s music that has had any prior connection to the grassroots severed, anything that might be considered controversial sucked out of it. It’s had its rough edges filed off, it’s been debated on focus panels before finally being shrink-wrapped, shipped out and shelved like any other commodity. Any vestige of what makes punk vital and relevant is missing in this milieu. It’s not even worth mentioning Simple Plan in the same short story as DIY culture, ‘zines, community organizing or anything else that has made punk necessary in the first place. They are, like many of their counterparts, one cog in the music industry’s willful depoliticization of punk rock. To be sure, punk is not alone in having this process exacted upon it. Any frank look at country, hip-hop, metal or R&B will reveal that this is simply what the music industry does. And when art has been twisted into commodity, it’s a lot easier to turn it into propaganda. Simple Plan are likely well aware that this is their role; this will be their third concert in Israel. Also published as the hounds of zaroff, this well-known plot has inspired numerous television show story lines and was adapted into a movie in 1932. Furthermore, news of their booking was re-tweeted via the State of Israel’s official Twitter account. As the Refrain Playing Israel website has , this squares perfectly with the words of Nissim Ben-Sheetrit, former deputy director general of the Israeli foreign ministry, when he said: “We are seeing culture as a hasbara [propaganda] tool of the first rank, and I do not differentiate between hasbara and culture. ”

This is, in a nutshell, why we think that an effort like Punks Against Apartheid–modest though it might be–is important in this day and age. Rallying punks behind the international call for boycott, divestment and sanctions isn’t only justified in its own right. It’s a crucial dimension in fighting against forces who have never had the best interests of a vital, rebellious sub-culture at heart–be they fundamentalist police departments, apartheid regimes looking for political cover, or the undeniably soulless drive of the free market. The past few years have made clear just how un-free this “free market” is. In fact, its reliance on racism and empire has been made unbelievably stark as mega conglomerates like Halliburton, DynCorps and even Burger King have been permitted to run amok in Iraq. Today, it’s sweetheart deals between the Israeli government and utility companies like Veolia Environment. Punk, even at its messy inception, was an instinctive wail against all of this and the stifling dehumanization that accompanied it. Simple Plan, however, have decided to be a part of that dehumanization. And so we urge all readers, punk or not, to bring the heat to Simple Plan’s front door. Send them emails protesting their decision to play in Israel. Post public statements on their calling them out for the poseurs they are. Vomit-inducing though it might be to “like” their page, the fact that the international BDS campaign may gain greater exposure will make it all worth it (you can always “unlike” them later). Ultimately, though, it is not bands like Simple Plan that drive us to do what we do. The strength, resistance, and vitality of local DIY punk culture will always be what carries us in the work and art we do. So if any band is going to be such willing and public participants in selling punk’s most treasured principles up the river, then they should expect no safe quarter in return. The plan to provide a soundtrack for apartheid may be “simple,” but that doesn’t make it any less repulsive.

On Wednesday night the radio show Roots Rock Rebel hosted one of Punks Against Apartheid’s founders, Alex Billet, for an interview about the origins of PAA, our campaign to get Jello Biafra not to play in Tel Aviv, and where we’re going from here. The discussion spanned from the boycott in South Africa to the punk scene in Israel. From the interview:

One of the most common arguments trotted against boycott is “well, there’s bad policies everywhere, why are you just singling out Israel?” I think that’s a valid question in some ways. But really it comes down to solidarity – straight up. This movement is really rooted in the 2005 call for boycott, divestment, and sanctions that came out of any civil society group of note within Palestine and from Arab communities within the ’48 borders.

…

This [cultural boycott] is not about silencing voices. As a matter of fact, it’s about the voices of Palestinians being heard much more than they currently are.

You can find the entire show from Wednesday night archived here (or here – just in case). The interview itself starts around the 36-minute mark, but it’s worth listening to the whole show if you have the time, especially if you need your daily dose of ska-punk.

Roots Rock Rebel airs every Wednesday night from 10pm-midnight on CKUT 90.3 FM in Montreal. It also streams live at www.ckut.ca. Roots Rock Rebel host & DJ, Aaron Lakoff, is a PAA member.

In other news, thanks to the efforts of a couple of generous community members, our points of unity have already been translated into Arabic and Korean. We’re expecting translations into Hebrew, French, and Turkish shortly. If you can help out by translating the points of unity into any other language please get in touch!

She began talking almost before I said hello and I found help for essay her words difficult to comprehend

Hello punks! The July 2nd concert inches ever closer, so with each day we want to bring you from a fan of Jello’s to drive home the diverse voices calling on him to.

Today, we bring you a short account written by Sylvia Posadas, a writer and musician from Queensland, Australia. Follow the jump to read it in full! And, as always, if you would like to submit an appeal yourself, in video, audio, or any other form, !

After several decades, it seems my path and Jello’s are diverging – despite denials, he’s spinning off to Israel to wallpaper over the apartheid crimes of the regime with his life work. Yes, I’m taking this personally. I’ve revelled in his songs for their abrupt condemnation of imperialism, its accomplices and crimes since the early 80s. His music was part of a fabulous repertoire which punctuated the critical strikes and struggle to reclaim the right to march from the police state of Joh Bjelke Petersen in Queensland Uber Alles, and the anti- apartheid campaign to liberate South Africa. Our community radio station, the legendary 4ZZZ, suffused our lives with punk.

While not so popular at paid gigs outside the city, the success and appeal of political songs by the likes of Jello, Chris Bailey of The Saints, The Clash and other punk innovators helped to inspire me to keep writing and performing them whenever I could.